Firm Order Set-Up and Process

Each fund has fiveGobi folders: the consultant’s folder, a request folder (name of fund “rq”), a hold folder (name of fund “h), a duplicates/problems folder (name of fund “dp”) and an export folder (name of fund “e”). Additionally there are folders for Not Yet Published; Out of Print or Out of Stock Titles (OP OR OS); and for titles that will come on Standing Orders/Continuations or should be placed as Standing Orders (SO CONT RQs).

Consultants move items from their folders to the request folders for the appropriate fund.

Each morning student workers in Acquisitions print titles in request folders and search them in the OPAC for duplicates. TheAcquisitions Librarianreviews the searched lists and moves items not ready for order from the request folder into the appropriate duplicate, hold, NYP, OP or OS, or SO/Cont. She places a fund note if the item is moving to the NYP, OP or OS, or SO/Cont folder. If money isn’t available for a particular fund, those requests move to the fund’s hold folder. If she has a question about a title, she creates an e-mail and sends that to the appropriate consultant.

The Acquisitions Librarian then exports those items ready for purchase by selecting the Gobi folders to export (NOT order). Once exported, she moves the records into the E or exported folder. When a title is selected to export, a form pops up to fill in the fund, location, and any other necessary notes. All the titles selected for export in one day are compiled into a single file by YBP.

When the Acquisitions Librarian completes the day’s exports, she imports the previous day’s file of the Gobititles into Millennium. The file contains short bib records with order records attached.After the file has been imported into Millennium using the create lists functionality, the Acquisitions Librarian creates an excel spreadsheet of the titles, including order record #, title, and bib record #. Due to generally accepted accounting procedures, another member of the Acquisitions staff sends the orders to YBP using Edifact. (Note: The items are not actually on order until this step takes place.)

OCLC notifies Acquisitions when the file of PomptCat records and invoices is ready and the books have been shipped.

When the books arrive, a student worker or staff unpacks the boxes,looksfor defects, checks the books against the invoice (paper copy included in the box) and the slipsin the books, and then quickly makes one more duplicates check in the OPAC.

Acquisitions staff then downloads the file from OCLC and processes the invoice in order for PromptCat records to overlay the short bib records and the invoice information to be entered into the order records.

In the accounting control process, Acquisitions staff check invoice amounts against Millennium records. Once released, reference librarians review the books, the titlesare stamped and stripped, and the items are sent for cataloging.

Process for Firm Orders NOT Originating in GOBI

The Acquisitions Librarian or her designee prints order requests received using the “Suggest a Purchase” process on the Library web site. Rarely a faculty member may utilize an old paper request form. A student logs those orders in by date and fund and then checks them for duplicates.

For titles that are not duplicates, the student checks GOBI. If they are available on Gobi, the title is placed in the H folder for the appropriate fund, and the student marks the YBP status and ++ on the order request.

The Acquisitions Librarian takes those requests and checks them against the Hold folder. If they are ready order (funds available, in stock, low stock, etc.), she exports them and follows the same process as for firm orders originating in GOBI. Once the title has been exported, she writes “on order” on the request and files it for return to the consultant.